7 ms·

Is having a '.name' email address a good idea?

32 points by arxanas 10y ago

akkartik 10y ago
I use a .name domain, but redirect .com to it. I also ended up using the .com for my MX record after experiences similar to those outlined in OP. This approach seems like the best of both worlds.
petercooper 10y ago
I find even having a .org email address to be a pain when stores/customer service/similar ask for it. They're expecting a .com or .co.uk on the end, I find, and I have to clarify what I said was right. Tempted to get a separate "easier" address to forward on :-)
- justinlardinois 10y ago
  Hell, even using an email address that's not a popular webmail host tends to throw people off. Mine is me@justinlardinois.com; I can't tell you how many times I've confused call center operators with it. I even had one think I meant justinlardinois@me.com.
  - WatchDog 10y ago
    Try using justin@justinlardinois.com It might be a bit redundant, but it's the pattern I use and I don't ever really have any problems, other than incredulous looks or comments about owning a domain name.
  - freehunter 10y ago
    I use Outlook.com for a lot and it confuses people. I say the first part and they immediately start typing @gmail.com. I even had a guy at my mechanic's shop tell me Outlook was the program I used to check my email, but Gmail was the actual address.
  - Normal_gaussian 10y ago
    I run with the pattern 'iam@<my domain>' This works well for everything except my personal domain. My first name is Eoin, pronounced like Ian. Several people have tried to correct the words I just explicitly spelled out to them. I've resorted to having people spell that one back.
    - notatoad 10y ago
      Using iam@domain when your name sounds like Ian seems like it's just asking for confusion.
      - Normal_gaussian 10y ago
        Absolutely. It was a naming scheme I adopted on other domains first and, being used to ian spelled my way, didn't notice as quickly as I should have. It's relatively low traffic and has a catch all however, so more just trivia at this point.
    - richardw 10y ago
      I can understand you wanting it spelled correctly but maybe add ian@ as an alias? For those times where mistakes seem likely.
      - Normal_gaussian 10y ago
        Yeah I have a catch all in, hence why I didn't change the address.
  - loeber 10y ago
    To add to the list of suggestions, the pattern I use is contact@<myname>.com. I've never received any questions with that address, though I don't use it particularly often.
  - dhruvkar 10y ago
    I use firstinitiallastinitial@<mynamedomain>.com. It's not as redundant as firstname@<mynamedomain>.com. and still seems like a personal email address as opposed to "me/iam/contact".
- lfowles 10y ago
  I don't find the org to be an issue so much as my FirstInitialLastName domain. I sometimes have to repeat that FirstInitial is there, since it seems more natural to people that I would have FirstName@LastName as my email address.
  - justinlardinois 10y ago
    lastname.com is the holy grail of domain names. You'd think with my fairly uncommon surname I'd be able to get mine, but it got snapped up in 1999 but some French construction contractor that's been using it to host a static site about his business ever since.
    - lfowles 10y ago
      I wouldn't know what to do if I got LastName.com. I'd probably make a service so other people sharing the name could have email addresses forwarded from it. heh.
      - justinlardinois 10y ago
        That's what RealNames does; it own the domains for a lot of common last names. trinh.com is one that comes to mind.
- JoshTriplett 10y ago
  I've never had problems with my .org domain. I think I once had a customer service person ask "Why dot org?", and they were satisfied by the answer "Well, I'm not a company..." I've had more problems caused by the occasional assumption that everyone in the world uses gmail.
- mkasu 10y ago
  Despite having some domains which I mostly use for gaming purposes and stuff, my main "serious" email address is @fastmail.fm. It is a nightmare to tell it to someone by phone. It goes as far as "dot fm, never heard that, do you mean .com?" Wtf, that doesn't even sound similar. Emails never arrive.
  - tga 10y ago
    Luckily for you, Fastmail eventually got their .com, so I believe @fastmail.com should also work now (not a customer so I don't know for sure).
justinlardinois 10y ago
A rare occasion where Betteridge's law[0] apples in a non-cynical way. .com was part of the zeitgeist of the late 90s and its cultural ties to the web and technology in general haven't faded since. Even using a .net domain makes you look a little off; I don't see much utility in attempting to use any of the countless TLDs that have proliferated since then. I get the impression that ICANN is trying to undermine the ubiquity of .com. I think it's a noble goal, but it hasn't been successful so far and I don't see any reason to believe things will change. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headline...
- vidarh 10y ago
  I was part of setting up .name - I'm named in the ICANN application - and I kinda agree with you. I've gone back to using my .com, because I had my <lastname>.com for years before we started .name and it's just simpler to get people to understand. But I think .com is being undermined quite effectively simply by it being "impossible" to find good names. I get .com's when I can find something reasonable, but otherwise look at other alternatives. It will just take a lot of time. I also think this is more apparent outside of the US, where we're used to using ccTLDs a lot more often, and where ".com" in many cases implies "foreign, like US" which may or may not be what a company would like. What's interesting to me is what "works" and doesn't as alternatives to .com. E.g. I hardly ever seem to visit ".info" or ".biz" (who launched at the same time as .name) sites, even though at the time (I have no idea what the relative counts are like today) they were vastly more successful than .name. I don't see that many ".name"'s either, but still far more than many of the other early new TLDs. While many of the ccTLDs have managed to build some level of popularity (e.g. ".io") and others seems to have faded into obscurity (".cx" used to be quite popular in tech circles, but I rarely see it any more).
  - justinlardinois 10y ago
    I think one of my favorite things about Hacker News is that you can comment on a technology and have a nonzero chance of someone who actually had a hand in it piping in. Also, I realize now I forgot to mention domain hacks, which I think do give non-.com TLDs a lot more value than they'd otherwise have. > But I think .com is being undermined quite effectively simply by it being "impossible" to find good names. In my opinion, a "just okay" .com is better than a good domain with some other TLD. I suspect this is a pretty common opinion. > I also think this is more apparent outside of the US, where we're used to using ccTLDs a lot more often I thought about this when I wrote my comment, but as an American it's not something I'm especially familiar with. Our own ccTLD .us isn't commonly used. > I hardly ever seem to visit ".info" or ".biz" (who launched at the same time as .name) sites, even though at the time (I have no idea what the relative counts are like today) they were vastly more successful than .name. I think the only reason these were ever popular is because they were priced so cheaply. It seems like .info is/was mostly used for throwaway domains, and .biz is just a terrible name. It's supposed to be for businesses, but it sounds like it'd only be used by shady used car dealerships. Nevermind that .com is officially for commercial entities anyways. > While many of the ccTLDs have managed to build some level of popularity (e.g. ".io") and others seems to have faded into obscurity (".cx" used to be quite popular in tech circles, but I rarely see it any more). I think .io is a fad that's going to die along with infinite scrolling websites. The fantasy notion of a "startup" is trendy and sexy right now even outside the industry, just like a "dotcom" was two decades ago. It'll fade away just like .tv did after the novelty of TV services on the web went away. Side note: would .tv still be big if Netflix used netflix.tv instead of netflix.com?
ilikejam 10y ago
I've had a .name email address since the TLD was released. Never had any problems with validators. 'Name' is a surprisingly easy word to mis-hear over the phone if it's not expected, though.
- vidarh 10y ago
  We definitively had problems with validators early on (I co-founded the company that pivoted into the .name registry; not been involved in it for over a decade - and it was sold to Verisign years ago), but we spent a lot of time harassing site owners with stupid validation, so most of the high profile ones were fixed very quickly. It helped that there were a number of other longer TLD's launched at the same time, like .info (there were a few that used lists of valid TLDs, as well, but mostly people just assumed the TLD couldn't be longer than three characters). ".name" was a pivot from offering an e-mail service (Nameplanet) were we let people register <something>@<lastname>.<various tlds> - we negotiated bulk deals with a range of TLD operators and so had 50k-60k domains or something like that. Problem with giving people a ".name", I think, is that people often don't get right away that you mean it literally. Especially if you have an unusual firstname/lastname that they know, and you try to avoid spelling out the e-mail address by going "my firstname at my lastname dot name". I've since gone back to just using my .com - discussing our respective <lastname>.<tld> and how there must be more people who'd like that was actually how it started.
calgoo 10y ago
I currently have a <lastname>.so domain for private email etc. Its working good, just a few people ask to clarify in the last 4 years of usage. However, I do worry that I could loose it as its a country TLD? For example, if someone from the country of origin would start a company for example, could they claim it? Does it depend on the country in question?
- AlecSchueler 10y ago
  Yes, each TLD is operated uniquely so it would depend on the country you're dealing with.
shabbyrobe 10y ago
I used to have all kinds of trouble communicating my personal email. My solution was to get the shortest unpronounceable domain name I could manage, paying as much attention as I could to visually unambiguous characters (though this was frustrated considerably by availability), and hooking it up to a catch-all domain mailbox. If I'm going to have to spell it anyway, why not make it as easy as possible? It makes it less cumbersome to use the NATO alphabet too, which I establish by starting with "b for bravo". Yes, this was a reaction to getting a few emails to "bravo@..."! I had to go with the .net TLD, but .net is WAY less confusing to people than my old .org. This process has not needed refinement for years.
folz 10y ago
I used to run a minecraft server for my friends on $NAME.com and still own the domain. There's apparently a construction company also called $NAME, and they own $NAME.net. $NAME.net is on all their branding, emails, contact info. As far as I know, they've never used $NAME.com. I routinely get email meant for them sent to to $NAME.com, sometimes including personal information, and sometimes from employees at the company. I guess their clients assume that businesses always own the dot-com for their name and don't think to verify the actual address (I'm not sure why the employees don't know their own email addresses). Because of that experience, I try to own the dot-com for any project I start.
- Spooky23 10y ago
  I have a common first initial last name gmail address and similar lastname.com domain addresses. The mail I get is astounding. I've received: - A word document containing most of somebody's online passwords, including work passwords and the vpn client for the persons work. - multi-angle Video of an accident investigation involving a bus flipping over a highway medium - a series of swimsuit modeling and sexy emails from some lady to her boyfriend, followed by angry emails about his lack of attention - football and soccer pools - emails from some guy who test drives various luxury cars every 3-4 months - legal papers from various people - fan mail to a niche celebrity
  - richardw 10y ago
    Same here (name.surname). Next Gmail account will be a guid because I get far too much junk. At one point I set up a Google group for my namesakes. If I recognise the context I forward it. Wish I could turn off Gmail equating namesurname with name.surname. That's far more than 50% of it. The lingerie pic was nice. Poor lady was very pleased I'd deleted it!
    - ghkbrew 10y ago
      If you exclusively use name.surname, you could set up a filter to catch anything sent to namesurname and automatically have it skip the inbox/put in a folder/deleted/whatever
RJIb8RBYxzAMX9u 10y ago
Perhaps I've just been lucky, but I've used a few novelty TLDs for e-mail, and never ran into any issues. My current go-to addresses are myfirstname@mylastname.email, for more professional settings, and <one letter>@<two letters>.<two letters> for quick throw-aways.
richard_todd 10y ago
I gave up my .name domain a few years ago, primarily because people didn't understand it. I was wondering if the recent explosion of TLDs might help everyone collectively realize that there's more than '.com', but it doesn't seem to be happening yet.
cstrat 10y ago
After reading this thread on HN (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12247401 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12247401) I made the move away from gmail to fastmail with my own TLD. I used a `.me` TLD. I love it. Works great and haven't been confused yet. Still trying to work out what to host on the domain other than my mail... maybe a resume or something.
- arxanas 10y ago
  I host a résumé (and most recently, a blog). I used to be pretty discoverable on Google by linking my StackOverflow, LinkedIn, Github, and website together, which seemed to have worked well. I think it was something like three of my links in the top five results, although I don't remember. (Then another Waleed Khan made the news and I'm still struggling to regain my search result spots.)
flashman 10y ago
I owned internets.computer for a year, then the novelty wore off. It was a tongue-in-cheek parody of branding and new TLDs, and great for catching certain tech-savvy people's attention, but ultimately not worth the several-times multiplier of a regular domain name.
CaliforniaKarl 10y ago
A .name email was what I went with after I graduated University, but I made the mistake of going for a first@last.name email address, instead of just buying the last.name domain directly. Even at the time, it was hard to find a provider, and I can't imagine how many there are now, but it must be a real small number. So, I've still got my first@last.name, but now I also own last.us, so first@last.us is my primary.
bstamour 10y ago
I used to own $lastname.email, but I ran into issues with other people's accounts flagging me as spam.
- flyinghamster 10y ago
  I'm not surprised. I tend to rate most of these new gold-rush TLDs as spam havens; I've certainly never anything but spam from a .club, .work, .rocks, .download, .stream, or other such address.
legohead 10y ago
I was following the .family domain, set up a calendar date for the public release, etc. Ended up learning a lot about these new private TLDs. They are controlled by a company, essentially, who can sell them for whatever they want and even raise prices on specific domains. ie. you can buy randomblah.family for the default $30, but for smith.family you're going to have to pay $5000 or whatever they set it at. My family name was set at $1300/year. I emailed the holders of the TLD and complained to them, seeing as it's not my fault I was born with a semi-common last name. Eventually, after the domain didn't sell, they emailed me offering to sell it at a one-time $1300 price but the renewal would be $30/year, forever. Not bad, but I'm still not paying $1300. So I'm sticking with the crappy domain I currently have.
thoughtsimple 10y ago
I use a .name address for all of my personal email. There are occasional problems but mostly it works just fine.
hundchenkatze 10y ago
I have $lastname.co and used $first@$lastname.co for a while... I should have known better. Obviously people would end up sending it to $lastname.com, because they thought it was a typo or I've even seen people just add the 'm' from muscle memory. Then I bought $lastname.xyz, and people just think I'm giving them a completely fake email.
- omginternets 10y ago
  Have you tried $lastname.sexy?
ajdlinux 10y ago
I have a .name domain which I don't use - I think ".name" just sounds... ugly. I use .id.au now, which I personally find much more aesthetically pleasing.
valine 10y ago
I tried using $NAME.co, but everyone seemed to think it was a typo. I Recently switched over to $NAME.io and haven't had any issues. It's short, looks nice, and I've had generally positive reactions to it.
edent 10y ago
Ha! You think that's bad, you should try having a Chinese domain name. None of the major webmail platforms would even acknowledge that it was a valid email address https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2014/01/poor-idn-support-from-major-webmail-providers/ https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2014/01/poor-idn-support-from-major... That was 2 years ago, time for an update!
kardashian007 10y ago
I used to do .name about 10 years but too many sites didn't allow "unconventional" TLDs and are/were hopelessly pathetic. Given that there are many more gTLDs and still sites can't manage a proper email "validation" regex, it's too hipster to bother with.

32 points by arxanas 10y ago

I use a .name domain, but redirect .com to it. I also ended up using the .com for my MX record after experiences similar to those outlined in OP. This approach seems like the best of both worlds.

petercooper 10y ago

I find even having a .org email address to be a pain when stores/customer service/similar ask for it. They're expecting a .com or .co.uk on the end, I find, and I have to clarify what I said was right. Tempted to get a separate "easier" address to forward on :-)

justinlardinois 10y ago
Hell, even using an email address that's not a popular webmail host tends to throw people off. Mine is me@justinlardinois.com; I can't tell you how many times I've confused call center operators with it. I even had one think I meant justinlardinois@me.com.
- WatchDog 10y ago
  Try using justin@justinlardinois.com It might be a bit redundant, but it's the pattern I use and I don't ever really have any problems, other than incredulous looks or comments about owning a domain name.
- freehunter 10y ago
  I use Outlook.com for a lot and it confuses people. I say the first part and they immediately start typing @gmail.com. I even had a guy at my mechanic's shop tell me Outlook was the program I used to check my email, but Gmail was the actual address.
- Normal_gaussian 10y ago
  I run with the pattern 'iam@<my domain>' This works well for everything except my personal domain. My first name is Eoin, pronounced like Ian. Several people have tried to correct the words I just explicitly spelled out to them. I've resorted to having people spell that one back.
  - notatoad 10y ago
    Using iam@domain when your name sounds like Ian seems like it's just asking for confusion.
    - Normal_gaussian 10y ago
      Absolutely. It was a naming scheme I adopted on other domains first and, being used to ian spelled my way, didn't notice as quickly as I should have. It's relatively low traffic and has a catch all however, so more just trivia at this point.
  - richardw 10y ago
    I can understand you wanting it spelled correctly but maybe add ian@ as an alias? For those times where mistakes seem likely.
    - Normal_gaussian 10y ago
      Yeah I have a catch all in, hence why I didn't change the address.
- loeber 10y ago
  To add to the list of suggestions, the pattern I use is contact@<myname>.com. I've never received any questions with that address, though I don't use it particularly often.
- dhruvkar 10y ago
  I use firstinitiallastinitial@<mynamedomain>.com. It's not as redundant as firstname@<mynamedomain>.com. and still seems like a personal email address as opposed to "me/iam/contact".
lfowles 10y ago
I don't find the org to be an issue so much as my FirstInitialLastName domain. I sometimes have to repeat that FirstInitial is there, since it seems more natural to people that I would have FirstName@LastName as my email address.
- justinlardinois 10y ago
  lastname.com is the holy grail of domain names. You'd think with my fairly uncommon surname I'd be able to get mine, but it got snapped up in 1999 but some French construction contractor that's been using it to host a static site about his business ever since.
  - lfowles 10y ago
    I wouldn't know what to do if I got LastName.com. I'd probably make a service so other people sharing the name could have email addresses forwarded from it. heh.
    - justinlardinois 10y ago
      That's what RealNames does; it own the domains for a lot of common last names. trinh.com is one that comes to mind.
JoshTriplett 10y ago
I've never had problems with my .org domain. I think I once had a customer service person ask "Why dot org?", and they were satisfied by the answer "Well, I'm not a company..." I've had more problems caused by the occasional assumption that everyone in the world uses gmail.
mkasu 10y ago
Despite having some domains which I mostly use for gaming purposes and stuff, my main "serious" email address is @fastmail.fm. It is a nightmare to tell it to someone by phone. It goes as far as "dot fm, never heard that, do you mean .com?" Wtf, that doesn't even sound similar. Emails never arrive.
- tga 10y ago
  Luckily for you, Fastmail eventually got their .com, so I believe @fastmail.com should also work now (not a customer so I don't know for sure).

justinlardinois 10y ago

A rare occasion where Betteridge's law[0] apples in a non-cynical way. .com was part of the zeitgeist of the late 90s and its cultural ties to the web and technology in general haven't faded since. Even using a .net domain makes you look a little off; I don't see much utility in attempting to use any of the countless TLDs that have proliferated since then. I get the impression that ICANN is trying to undermine the ubiquity of .com. I think it's a noble goal, but it hasn't been successful so far and I don't see any reason to believe things will change. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headline...

vidarh 10y ago
I was part of setting up .name - I'm named in the ICANN application - and I kinda agree with you. I've gone back to using my .com, because I had my <lastname>.com for years before we started .name and it's just simpler to get people to understand. But I think .com is being undermined quite effectively simply by it being "impossible" to find good names. I get .com's when I can find something reasonable, but otherwise look at other alternatives. It will just take a lot of time. I also think this is more apparent outside of the US, where we're used to using ccTLDs a lot more often, and where ".com" in many cases implies "foreign, like US" which may or may not be what a company would like. What's interesting to me is what "works" and doesn't as alternatives to .com. E.g. I hardly ever seem to visit ".info" or ".biz" (who launched at the same time as .name) sites, even though at the time (I have no idea what the relative counts are like today) they were vastly more successful than .name. I don't see that many ".name"'s either, but still far more than many of the other early new TLDs. While many of the ccTLDs have managed to build some level of popularity (e.g. ".io") and others seems to have faded into obscurity (".cx" used to be quite popular in tech circles, but I rarely see it any more).
- justinlardinois 10y ago
  I think one of my favorite things about Hacker News is that you can comment on a technology and have a nonzero chance of someone who actually had a hand in it piping in. Also, I realize now I forgot to mention domain hacks, which I think do give non-.com TLDs a lot more value than they'd otherwise have. > But I think .com is being undermined quite effectively simply by it being "impossible" to find good names. In my opinion, a "just okay" .com is better than a good domain with some other TLD. I suspect this is a pretty common opinion. > I also think this is more apparent outside of the US, where we're used to using ccTLDs a lot more often I thought about this when I wrote my comment, but as an American it's not something I'm especially familiar with. Our own ccTLD .us isn't commonly used. > I hardly ever seem to visit ".info" or ".biz" (who launched at the same time as .name) sites, even though at the time (I have no idea what the relative counts are like today) they were vastly more successful than .name. I think the only reason these were ever popular is because they were priced so cheaply. It seems like .info is/was mostly used for throwaway domains, and .biz is just a terrible name. It's supposed to be for businesses, but it sounds like it'd only be used by shady used car dealerships. Nevermind that .com is officially for commercial entities anyways. > While many of the ccTLDs have managed to build some level of popularity (e.g. ".io") and others seems to have faded into obscurity (".cx" used to be quite popular in tech circles, but I rarely see it any more). I think .io is a fad that's going to die along with infinite scrolling websites. The fantasy notion of a "startup" is trendy and sexy right now even outside the industry, just like a "dotcom" was two decades ago. It'll fade away just like .tv did after the novelty of TV services on the web went away. Side note: would .tv still be big if Netflix used netflix.tv instead of netflix.com?

ilikejam 10y ago

I've had a .name email address since the TLD was released. Never had any problems with validators. 'Name' is a surprisingly easy word to mis-hear over the phone if it's not expected, though.

vidarh 10y ago
We definitively had problems with validators early on (I co-founded the company that pivoted into the .name registry; not been involved in it for over a decade - and it was sold to Verisign years ago), but we spent a lot of time harassing site owners with stupid validation, so most of the high profile ones were fixed very quickly. It helped that there were a number of other longer TLD's launched at the same time, like .info (there were a few that used lists of valid TLDs, as well, but mostly people just assumed the TLD couldn't be longer than three characters). ".name" was a pivot from offering an e-mail service (Nameplanet) were we let people register <something>@<lastname>.<various tlds> - we negotiated bulk deals with a range of TLD operators and so had 50k-60k domains or something like that. Problem with giving people a ".name", I think, is that people often don't get right away that you mean it literally. Especially if you have an unusual firstname/lastname that they know, and you try to avoid spelling out the e-mail address by going "my firstname at my lastname dot name". I've since gone back to just using my .com - discussing our respective <lastname>.<tld> and how there must be more people who'd like that was actually how it started.

calgoo 10y ago

I currently have a <lastname>.so domain for private email etc. Its working good, just a few people ask to clarify in the last 4 years of usage. However, I do worry that I could loose it as its a country TLD? For example, if someone from the country of origin would start a company for example, could they claim it? Does it depend on the country in question?

AlecSchueler 10y ago
Yes, each TLD is operated uniquely so it would depend on the country you're dealing with.

shabbyrobe 10y ago

I used to have all kinds of trouble communicating my personal email. My solution was to get the shortest unpronounceable domain name I could manage, paying as much attention as I could to visually unambiguous characters (though this was frustrated considerably by availability), and hooking it up to a catch-all domain mailbox. If I'm going to have to spell it anyway, why not make it as easy as possible? It makes it less cumbersome to use the NATO alphabet too, which I establish by starting with "b for bravo". Yes, this was a reaction to getting a few emails to "bravo@..."! I had to go with the .net TLD, but .net is WAY less confusing to people than my old .org. This process has not needed refinement for years.

folz 10y ago

I used to run a minecraft server for my friends on $NAME.com and still own the domain. There's apparently a construction company also called $NAME, and they own $NAME.net. $NAME.net is on all their branding, emails, contact info. As far as I know, they've never used $NAME.com. I routinely get email meant for them sent to to $NAME.com, sometimes including personal information, and sometimes from employees at the company. I guess their clients assume that businesses always own the dot-com for their name and don't think to verify the actual address (I'm not sure why the employees don't know their own email addresses). Because of that experience, I try to own the dot-com for any project I start.

Spooky23 10y ago
I have a common first initial last name gmail address and similar lastname.com domain addresses. The mail I get is astounding. I've received: - A word document containing most of somebody's online passwords, including work passwords and the vpn client for the persons work. - multi-angle Video of an accident investigation involving a bus flipping over a highway medium - a series of swimsuit modeling and sexy emails from some lady to her boyfriend, followed by angry emails about his lack of attention - football and soccer pools - emails from some guy who test drives various luxury cars every 3-4 months - legal papers from various people - fan mail to a niche celebrity
- richardw 10y ago
  Same here (name.surname). Next Gmail account will be a guid because I get far too much junk. At one point I set up a Google group for my namesakes. If I recognise the context I forward it. Wish I could turn off Gmail equating namesurname with name.surname. That's far more than 50% of it. The lingerie pic was nice. Poor lady was very pleased I'd deleted it!
  - ghkbrew 10y ago
    If you exclusively use name.surname, you could set up a filter to catch anything sent to namesurname and automatically have it skip the inbox/put in a folder/deleted/whatever

RJIb8RBYxzAMX9u 10y ago

Perhaps I've just been lucky, but I've used a few novelty TLDs for e-mail, and never ran into any issues. My current go-to addresses are myfirstname@mylastname.email, for more professional settings, and <one letter>@<two letters>.<two letters> for quick throw-aways.

richard_todd 10y ago

I gave up my .name domain a few years ago, primarily because people didn't understand it. I was wondering if the recent explosion of TLDs might help everyone collectively realize that there's more than '.com', but it doesn't seem to be happening yet.

cstrat 10y ago

After reading this thread on HN (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12247401 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12247401) I made the move away from gmail to fastmail with my own TLD. I used a `.me` TLD. I love it. Works great and haven't been confused yet. Still trying to work out what to host on the domain other than my mail... maybe a resume or something.

arxanas 10y ago
I host a résumé (and most recently, a blog). I used to be pretty discoverable on Google by linking my StackOverflow, LinkedIn, Github, and website together, which seemed to have worked well. I think it was something like three of my links in the top five results, although I don't remember. (Then another Waleed Khan made the news and I'm still struggling to regain my search result spots.)

flashman 10y ago

I owned internets.computer for a year, then the novelty wore off. It was a tongue-in-cheek parody of branding and new TLDs, and great for catching certain tech-savvy people's attention, but ultimately not worth the several-times multiplier of a regular domain name.

CaliforniaKarl 10y ago

A .name email was what I went with after I graduated University, but I made the mistake of going for a first@last.name email address, instead of just buying the last.name domain directly. Even at the time, it was hard to find a provider, and I can't imagine how many there are now, but it must be a real small number. So, I've still got my first@last.name, but now I also own last.us, so first@last.us is my primary.

bstamour 10y ago

I used to own $lastname.email, but I ran into issues with other people's accounts flagging me as spam.

flyinghamster 10y ago
I'm not surprised. I tend to rate most of these new gold-rush TLDs as spam havens; I've certainly never anything but spam from a .club, .work, .rocks, .download, .stream, or other such address.

legohead 10y ago

I was following the .family domain, set up a calendar date for the public release, etc. Ended up learning a lot about these new private TLDs. They are controlled by a company, essentially, who can sell them for whatever they want and even raise prices on specific domains. ie. you can buy randomblah.family for the default $30, but for smith.family you're going to have to pay $5000 or whatever they set it at. My family name was set at $1300/year. I emailed the holders of the TLD and complained to them, seeing as it's not my fault I was born with a semi-common last name. Eventually, after the domain didn't sell, they emailed me offering to sell it at a one-time $1300 price but the renewal would be $30/year, forever. Not bad, but I'm still not paying $1300. So I'm sticking with the crappy domain I currently have.

thoughtsimple 10y ago

I use a .name address for all of my personal email. There are occasional problems but mostly it works just fine.

hundchenkatze 10y ago

I have $lastname.co and used $first@$lastname.co for a while... I should have known better. Obviously people would end up sending it to $lastname.com, because they thought it was a typo or I've even seen people just add the 'm' from muscle memory. Then I bought $lastname.xyz, and people just think I'm giving them a completely fake email.

omginternets 10y ago
Have you tried $lastname.sexy?

ajdlinux 10y ago

I have a .name domain which I don't use - I think ".name" just sounds... ugly. I use .id.au now, which I personally find much more aesthetically pleasing.

valine 10y ago

I tried using $NAME.co, but everyone seemed to think it was a typo. I Recently switched over to $NAME.io and haven't had any issues. It's short, looks nice, and I've had generally positive reactions to it.

edent 10y ago

Ha! You think that's bad, you should try having a Chinese domain name. None of the major webmail platforms would even acknowledge that it was a valid email address https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2014/01/poor-idn-support-from-major-webmail-providers/ https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2014/01/poor-idn-support-from-major... That was 2 years ago, time for an update!

kardashian007 10y ago

I used to do .name about 10 years but too many sites didn't allow "unconventional" TLDs and are/were hopelessly pathetic. Given that there are many more gTLDs and still sites can't manage a proper email "validation" regex, it's too hipster to bother with.